Pieces of a TIN Model

Just feeling like scribbling a few random things down in one long post instead of several short bursts. I'm definitely caught in a nice Triangular Irregular Network full of stochastic processes... but as one of my favorite characters once said, "To live is an awfully big adventure".

Relaxation

Besides shooting them, I also really enjoy making arrows. There's just something about turning shafts of wood, glue, feathers, and pieces of plastic and metal into something powerful, beautiful, and ultimately, deadly, in the right hands. I'm split between wood and carbon -- I enjoy the wood arrows because there's a lot more I can do with them and there's a sense of "bonding" with the arrows that doesn't involving glue, but I also enjoy the carbon arrows bebcause they're almost indestructible and are a lot more precise. I can't wait to start my next batch of wooden arrows, which will be cedar (like ones I've made before) but also stained, sealed, and spined to the proper stiffness to turn them into real killers.

Frodo Baggins Syndrome

So I was at an ecology group meeting today and while I was scouting out for potential brains to start picking at, I noticed that everyone was signing up for a time to do some kind of presenation. Only thing was, nobody wanted to present next week, not even the really outgoing young professor from the wildlife department. After the paper went around for a while, the professors in charge were looking for someone to present and I had asked one of them about something else. I don't know what hit me next, but I suddenly said "I'll take it!" I felt like I was at the Council of Elrond and I had just played the role of Frodo Baggins. And now I'm going to have to cough up a presentation... and a manuscript!

More Kills!

I have now added another lizard to my kills -- they need to really stop taking naps between the cardboard target face and the foam or cardboard backing. I also have 2 more giant roach-like bugs in my list of kills. One of them was actually something I aimed at from 10 meters, but the other also made the mistake of hiding in that little space and I managed to nail it from about 25 meters back. As usual, it was with my Chek-Mate recurve, which is getting easier to get accurate shots with now even though my practice time has been severely cut. I've been limiting myself to the practice range because I don't have as much time to dedicate to my shooting, so I've only been doing accuracy and precision drills. The precision drills are a lot easier for me, but in a real tournament or hunting situation, I also need accuracy at a wide range of distances. Coming to think of it, I really feel like shooting!

Nightmare From Hell

In an attempt to be fully alert in my classes (darned early mornings combined with afternoon seminars... and taking the bus to save on ulcers and funding), I tried to go to sleep at a dismally early 21.00 hrs so I can get up early enough. Only problem is I had a serious nightmare, one bad enough where I'm still severely rattled and no amount of "quick laughter" or weight-lifting or shooting at the 3-D target I swiped can relieve so far.

Without going into gratuitous details, let's just say the nightmare involved being forced to live a lifestyle completely incompatible with someone who's having daydreams of being a leader in plant ecophysiology, an archer (both as a hunter and a tournament archer), and generally being able to enjoy solitude in the natural world without any cumbersome entities. It was about par with removing the flight feathers from an eagle and then stuffing it into a parakeet cage and putting the cage in a room full of malicious toddlers and infants and being forced to watch soap operas.

Besides hastily scribbling thoughts here I've also been watching (out from the corner of my eyes) some rather amusing music clips... in a strange way, some of them are actually soothing even if they are very up-beat. I don't know what it is, but just as a sample, I've put a link to one of these clips... Youtube is a great way to lose sleep... or to calm down after a REALLY bad nightmare. I'm not sure what it is... I'm just glad that it's calming me down enough to attempt to sleep.

Week 1 in the Forestry Department...

For a first week of school, things went pretty darned smoothly. I only got lost once in the forestry/wildlife building and only once in the monster buildings collectively called "McCarty Hall". I like all 3 of my classes, especially my botany class, which focuses on plant ecophysiology. Of course, I am a plant ecophysiologist with a particular liking for forests and ecosystem processes.

The only down-side to the week? The beginnings of a cold that's made me decide to stay home tonight instead of checking out the athletic facilities ... and a capoiera/breakdance group on campus that meets on Friday nights. I think I picked up the bug from one of my office-mates, a fellow ecologist who's also based in the forestry department who's been sick all week. Given the nature of the bug, I think I'm also going to be stuck at home this weekend, which is going to really hurt because I haven't gone shooting for almost 3 days... and not shooting for more than a few days has been known to have strange effects on me. Maybe I should swipe that discarded 3-D target or invest in one of those cheap bag targets, mount it on a chair, and start shooting at that when I can't go to the range for whatever reason.

I can't wait to start on a project. Right now I've got lots of ideas, mostly along the line of multi-scale studies on different types of ecosystems. Based on talking to some of the professors, I'm starting to think about looking at the different types of coniferous forests ranging from the predominantly longleaf/slash pines in Florida to the boreal forests out in Alaska and trying to develop a mechanistic model of evapotranspiration and carbon fluxes. I think I even have some strong candidates for my PhD committee... including a professor I mistook for a fellow grad student. Put it this way... a rugby player who runs the flux towers that the forestry (and botany) departments utilize and has worked with many of the people I collaborated with while I was at Cal State LA while he was in Barrow, Alaska.

Time to curl up and let my immune system do its thing so I can be at full juice on Monday... almost...

There's a really nifty video clip on http://www.martinarchery.com Just follow the link on the sneak peek for the 2007 Bengal and there's a little link to a video. Something about it was just rather... intriguing. While most people would rather admire tasteless fashion crap, I prefer the beauty of a well-shot arrow and a clean form. My bias is still much more towards the traditional bows, but there's still a different beauty in a compound bow. Just make sure it's not one of those scary-looking, gaudy target bows.

SFRC Orientation and Telcontar

Telcontar: I usually don't put links to videos, but these two pretty much helped inspire me to write the story...

http://youtube.com/watch?v=xCXzpTWMenc
http://youtube.com/watch?v=-gkiRE-DhMc

I'm not going to say too much else besides letting you guess how on earth two of my favorite singers influenced this story.

As far as the SFRC (School of Forestry Resources & Conservation) went, it was pretty darned good for an all-day orientation event. It was at the Austin Carey Memorial Forest, which is a nice short drive away from home, not far from the airport. It was a blast being able to meet fellow forestry people and realizing that they're not only very engaging and knowledgeable, but also quirky, although no group will ever come close to Caltech students in terms of being fun and quirky. Of all the orientations I've had to sit through, this was by far my favorite, not only because they actually fed us something besides junk food, but also because I was able to talk about my research without drawing blank looks and listen to my peers talk about their research and catching my attention.

The Austin Carey Forest is actually a fairly "typical" forest in this part of Florida with the upper canopy of mixed pines (mostly long-leaf but also slash) and a lower canopy that's either grasses or saw palmettos, depending on when the last fire was. It's also an AmeriFlux site and I'd love to see if I can get it added to SpecNet :) I have a distinct feeling that my research will ultimately be tied to fire and drought effects, at least based on what the professors told me about the site. I'm looking forward to doing field work here, at least if I do take on this site... but I'm still hoping to see if I can get some work in the Boreal forest and other SpecNet sites so I can really make use of the Spectral Network!

Tomorrow is the first day of school, which means I start studying again! I'm just hoping that my hunting instincts won't kick in too hard!

Stereotypes?

Q: What do you call a short person with glasses, a hat, a T-shirt, shorts, and something interesting to read?

A: A scientist!

Apparently there's something about that appearance that screams "scientist" to a lot of people. I went to get some take-out food, having decided that I've had enough spinach and bell pepper salad, and after I placed my order for something filling, the person at the counter looks at me and just says "Hey, you're a scientist, aren't you?" I was tempted to ask what science, but I decided against it because I just wanted my food, having been hungry for quite some time. The real fun, though was when I had to set my reading material down next to me so I could sign the receipt and the cashier looked horrified when she saw what I was going to read while waiting. I had an issue of Traditional Bowhunter with the page turned to a review of a really cool high-powered compact longbow, complete with broadhead-tipped arrows and a picture of a hunter with an animal they just shot. Is it me, or is it just that nobody seems to expect a 5'2" Asian female scientist in training to be interested in bow-hunting or to be able to draw more than about 30 lbs?

Dunheasa / Telcontar Update

I'm hoping I can finish the sequel to Journey to Dunheasa before school really kicks in. The sequel is still tentatively titled to Telcontar Restored but that's always prone to change. As of now, I'm standing in Dunheasa with the Eternal Huntress, wondering about the source of that unearthliy beautiful baritone voice that broke her concentration while hunting.

At this point, all I can say about Telcontar is that it's a much more challenging story to fully flesh out and write than the much more linear and focused Dunheasa. Telcontar is nonetheless a fun story to write, especially with one of the heroes who is a mixture of two of my all-time favorite singers (Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode and Alfonso Pichardo of Moenia) and several of my peers throughout my academic career.

Oh and here's another gratuitous picture what my "best round" at the range this morning with my trusty Chek-Mate. This time I used a set of practice arrows with reflective white cresting and semi-reflective shield-cut white fletching after losing far too many of my good carbon arrows... and the results weren't too shabby at 20 yards, but my form still needs a lot of work, as the large spread and two outliers indicate!

Some More Murphy's Laws...

#1 -- Any exceptionally well-made and expensive arrow, especially in a relatively fresh batch, will be shot into one or more of the following within a few days of creation: an active bee/hornet/wasp nest, large patch of poison oak/ivy/sumac, network of active black widow or brown recluse spider webs, and/or be buried under about 2-3 inches of vegetable litter with fire ant outposts everywhere. Or if it doesn't land in a bad spot, then it gets Robin-Hooded beyond repair. Conversely, the easiest arrows to retrieve from a miss due to tension, poor technique, or bad distance judgement are typically the older, not-so-well-made arrows that need to be repaired or replaced.

#2 -- The one time I decide to wear something appropriate for the temperature and humidity is the one time I also miss a lot of targets and need to go into dense underbrush to find arrows. If I'm wearing full desert camouflage treated with insect repellent and guarded against anyone trying to get a space on the walking bug buffet, I always hit the target.

#3 -- If I'm going to get munched on or stung, it will be right when I'm trying to retrieve said masterpiece from #1 and while wearing something that won't make me overheat.

#4 -- The one place I can set down my trusty bow away from the local fire ants and spiders will usually be right underneath a popular P-mail site for birds.

#5 -- My arrows tend to get driven further into the target (or wooden frame or tree) than the arrow that came from a 60 lb bow from the same distance. Hmm... maybe that 125 grain field point on an arrow designed for hunting could be the reason... most other target shooters use those insanely light arrows that just poke the target, not try to go through flesh, lungs, and other organs and tear them up along the way...

#6 -- The most likely location for a sting is somewhere that makes it almost impossible to concentrate... like the eyelid or hand. The most likely spot for a bite is that one spot that can't be reached and was covered in clothing with no obvious entrances there.

Even with all these little Murphy's laws, I still love outdoors traditional archery in the Florida wilderness. I'd rather have the occasional bite or sting than just sit indoors like some kind of potato, there's just too much to enjoy outdoors. I think I just need to bathe in a mixture of Deet, Bidrin, DDVP, and Naled... or go back to using soaps like Dial. Oh and I also need to treat my clothing with something to repel the local insect and arachnid life too. I like bugs, but I don't exactly appreciate them munching on me or attacking me when I try to retrieve an arrow because my form and/or aim were off.

I've also picked the classes I'll be taking this fall with a bit of help from my new adviser. It's hard when I'm limited to 9 (was originally 12, but the fellowship got turned into an assistantship) credits but at the same time, maybe I can finally have a report card that doesn't have 3 really solid grades and 1 horrible grade and really get the material in :) I'm definitely moving up in this world -- I now have my office space and a key into my new extended territory.

Time for me to do what I set out to do... with the understanding that there's always room for outdoors and exercise!

Where's the Nerds and/or Fellow Outdoors Types?

My natural early-morning activity: archery or hiking... or sleeping, depending on what I did the night before. Sitting through an orientation session with almost 1200 other graduate students while listening to a lot of talk about how great the football and basketball teams are.

Oh and another shocker for me -- many of the students I ran into didn't even have a research component to their program and were in some pretty strange fields like business and journalism. The closest thing to comfort for me was a small group of somewhat disoriented Chinese math and physics PhD students who were looking for "comforting" person. I probably provided about 30 seconds of reassurance when they saw my Caltech hat during the mandatory "say hi to your neighbors, tell your major, undergrad institution, and a hobby or two" bit, but I think I scared pretty badly when I indicated that I'm an ecologist with a focus in forestry and that I really fond of traditional archery and that I'm a member of Traditional Bowhunters of Florida. There's nothing scary about being someone who wants to bow-hunt species that are overpopulating the region because humans idiotically removed all the natural predators, is there?

After the mandatory sit-on-my-butt-for-too-long orientation, I had to deal with paperwork and clearing holds on enrollment. Not exactly fun, but I have to do it to start the real adventure (the PhD, not the bow-hunting) and I didn't really get to interact much more with my fellow graduate students. I'm guessing that I'll be much once I go to orientations in forestry and the School of Natural Resources and Environment when I can actually meet people who are at least semi- in my field.

I'm really itching for a bit of shooting actually, but not having anything really good to shoot at indoors, I think I'm just going to drool at some more classes to take the next few semesters.

TBOF 2006 Florida Fall Rendezvous

So... after being a bit miffed about having to miss out on some fun on Wednesday, I found out on Friday morning that there's another shoot I can go to and really have some fun. This shoot was in Ocala National Forest, which is a bit of a drive, but it was worth all the time, money, lost arrows, and insect bites.

Friday: Coon Shoot
This was a real fun event if I didn't score at all. It was a nice 10-shot shoot in the dark with a flashlight inside a jug to highlight the critter being shot at, which was almost always some small nocturnal mammal. This was the first fully dark shoot I had ever been to and let's just say I kept aiming at the jug with the light! I came pretty darned close to hitting this one darned albino squirrel, but I overestimated the height and managed to break a nearby tree limb instead. All in all, it was a real blast even if I lost 1 arrow... next time I get arrows, I'm putting on those reflective crests and/or glowing nocks!

Saturday: Fred Bear and Howard Hill
This was a series of 2 20-target ranges. The first one was Fred Bear, which involved lots of going through dense vegetation (thank goodness for Off! bug repellent). I had major target anxiety and only scored 55/200 on the Fred Bear, which someone later told me was "pretty damned good for a first-time foreigner" and that it was normal for people to lose about 2-3 arrows at this course. I lost 3 arrows, although one of them did come back to me. The Howard Hill course was also a very challenging range and was a lot more nerve-wracking because several of the targets are right against the lake, so if I miss, that arrow goes swimming with the fishies. Let's just say just about everyone loses at least 2-3 arrows at this range too the first time they shoot at it. I did a lot better on it, mostly because I had some really lucky shots, giving me 85/200 on the Howard Hill. The most amusing shot by far that day was this one large turkey that had its back on the archer. Let's just say this one was also very anatomically correct and I got it somewhere that caused lots of laughter. All in all, 140/400, although if breaking tree limbs and getting them embedded really hard with a light-draw bow were worth points, I would've gotten close to 300 points for all the damage I did to the trees. The Howard Hill took 3 of my arrows, including one that went into the water as a sacrifice to the water spirits. Not too bad for the combination of target anxiety, trying to adjust to the sauna, and not having much experience in real forest surroundings.

Sunday: Final Round @ Howard Hill
I didn't do too well, but it was still a blast. I got placed with other women who shot either recurves or longbows with non-wooden arrows who apparently also felt a bit self-conscious about their scores. I think my fear of the water and losing yet more arrows really hurt me on this one, but every time I remembered to focus on a tiny spot on the target, I had a pretty solid shot. There were a few arrows that I really drove in good, including this one where I shot pretty far into a cypress stump. We couldn't quite pull it out until I decided to put all my weight into the effort and I literally fell flat onto my butt like in the cartoons when someone tries to pull something out. My arrow survived! I also earned the nickname "Pooper Shooter" because I hit several targets either in or very close to the business end, especially that one turkey and this one raccoon where I thought I missed, but turned out that I hit it right under the tail. All in all, I scored 55/200 on this one, which wasn't all that bad for an early morning shoot! Overall I came out with 195/600, which looked pretty embarassing compared to all these people who were getting much higher scores, although the top scores were still in the 400s except for one or two insanely good people, but I still had way too much fun and now I've got a nice base-line to work on :) I also learned a few more tricks of the trade that'll (hopefully) turn me into an archer deadly enough to hunt safely!

Laughter Cures and Macho Syndrome

Somehow, my stomach has been rather... unhappy... at something I ate today (I blame the seasoning packet that came with the bowl of instant noodles -- most mushrooms, especially Asian ones, even in small amounts, will give me quite memorable stomach woes) and leading to the cancellation of some wonderful plans I had revolving around shooting defenseless targets with my trusty Chek-Mate Hunter I. Needless to say, I wasn't exactly happy about having to sit at home and grab my stomach and do all the usual stuff for major indigestion. Anyway, I decided to do anything to make me forget the pain in my digestive system. And no, it's not lethal or anything, but extremely annoying and is a real damper on anything fun (ie, going outdoors).

Part 1: Hilarious Web-Sites

So... I just poked my head into a couple of sites a friend of mine sent me. Note that some of them are quite crude/vulgar to the easily offended, so reader beware! Here's a list of the ones that made me laugh until something else started hurting:

http://www.tuckermax.com (funniest by a long-shot but also may be offensive)
http://maddox.xmission.com (also has a great book)
http://www.homestarrunner.com (non-offensive material)

I pretty much felt better instantly after reading/watching the material!

Part 2: The Moth Returns to the Flame

I have a scar on my left arm from a botched attempt to shoot a high-powered compound bow by BowTech (Equalizer if you want to know the exact model). It was still a safe fire, but that was before I had the strength to draw back 40+ lbs or the understanding of how a compound bow works. I have long since been mildly afraid to handle compound bows until a few days ago. A minor spike in whatever chemicals that induce macho behavior inspired me to start trying out different compound bows. Here's a list of compounds that I've tried and what I thought of them.

Hoyt Selena -- I shot it at about 47 and then 43 lbs at 24" draw. It was ok, but for some reason I still have a weird grudge against Hoyt, probably because my retinas are still scarred from looking at some of their target bows. I probably won't be able to give this bow a very fair assessment because I also got a pretty nice bruise that hurts when I touch it from this one at the 43 lbs draw weight. It also gave me some handshock when I fired it and there was just something about the grip that made me think "excessively girly". Also, after I shot this one, I deliberately had the draw weight set significantly below what I was comfortable with because I didn't want to have another accident where I forgot that I had to draw it back to the let-off point.

PSE Deer Hunter -- I shot this puppy at 37 lbs at 24" draw. Unlike any of the others I shot, this had a single cam (more like a wheel). I didn't really like the feel of this one, although it didn't have any glaringly bad features. It did give me quite a bit of hand-shock and it was a fairly slow bow. I think my Chek-Mate is faster than this one pound for pound!

Bear Odyssey -- I shot this one at about 38 lbs at 24" draw. This one was a pretty nice one with a nice grip that actually felt substantial and for a cheap introductory bow, it felt really good firing it. It had a nice smooth draw and I got very little shock when I fired it. It's also a very small bow and very light (about 32" axle-to-axle and a bit under 3 lbs). For a non-competetive bow (this one can go from 35-50 lbs draw weight) or hunting small critters (rodents and lagomorphs), I think this one would be pretty good especially since the weight range goes from 35-50 lbs instead of the typical 30-40 or 40-50 lbs. Another bonus: this bow is actually easy on the eyes too! If I had to get a compound, this one would be a VERY strong contender, especially since the price tag (about $200 for the bow + accessories) is pretty sweet.

Browning Micro-Adrenaline -- I shot this one at about 37 lbs at 23.5" draw. This was a pretty nice bow with a nice grip, not quite as nice as the Odyssey, but it had a nice punch to it. It had a bit more gradual draw, which I appreciated and fired fairly nicely. Overall, it's a bit more high-performance than the Odyssey and it's another strong contender. My only complaint about this one is that the balance didn't quite feel as good as the Odyssey.

Bowtech Equalizer -- I shot this one twice: once at 43 lbs @ 25" (that's when I got my scar) and once at about 39 lbs at 23.5" draw. By far this is the fastest thing I've ever shot. As far as the grip goes, this one was the only one that I liked more than the Odyssey. The other cool part is that pound for pound, this is probably the fastest short-draw bow (or any compound) on the market. Oh, and it's the only compound that has a grip that I like better than the Odyssey. A lot more. The down-side to this one? The nearly $700 price tag and possibly having to get a release aid to shoot this one comfortably because it did give me some finger pinch. But if I really want to start competing seriously and/or hunt anything larger than rodents and lagomorphs, then this is pretty much as top-of-the-line as it gets for a short-draw compound.

Conclusion:
I think I'm just going to stay with pure traditional for a while more even if there are some models of compounds I really enjoy... at least until I can put some more muscles in my upper body and build up some confidence in my ability to draw all 45+ lbs without letting go or hurting anything!